


Bleeding Through the Edges

by afrocurl



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Community: apocalyptothon, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-15
Updated: 2010-05-15
Packaged: 2018-02-13 11:54:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2149815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afrocurl/pseuds/afrocurl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Change is in the works now, he knows.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bleeding Through the Edges

**Author's Note:**

  * For [maharetr](https://archiveofourown.org/users/maharetr/gifts).



> Betaed by the lovely [](http://starxd-sparrow.livejournal.com/profile)[**starxd_sparrow**](http://starxd-sparrow.livejournal.com/) and written for [](http://maharetr.livejournal.com/profile)[**maharetr**](http://maharetr.livejournal.com/) for the 2010 [](http://apocalyptothon.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://apocalyptothon.livejournal.com/)**apocalyptothon**.

He pops the top off a bottle, a motion second nature to him now, and wanders around the small space of the new Roadhouse. He’s still trying to figure out what to do with his time; without hunters ambling through the doors as they had in the past, bursting with stories and news or bleeding from wounds requiring the sort of attention hospitals didn’t like to give without asking questions, the place wasn’t the same, but it was somewhere to pass the time. It is home, he supposes.

_Time, of which there is an infinite amount. Time that will repeat the same series of events over and over again._

Sam and Dean came and went, but the comings and goings of the bar remain the same. Pamela drops by, has a drink, leaves. On the days she doesn’t show, Ash hears the floorboards creak, the bottles rattling as he walks by. The wind moans outside as though it’s expressing the world’s pain.

Boring, he thinks. There are no more demons to hunt, and with only one patron, there’s little he does that extends beyond the grabbing of bottles she asks for (whiskey first, beer later).

Ash accepts that his version of heaven isn’t the most normal of circumstances, but it is comfortable, and most days, it’s easy. The thrill of a hunt has past him by, but on rare occasions, he misses it. Yearns for it almost, but the moment he recognizes it, the feeling subsides leaving him with the quiet complacency of this bar and his lone customer.

Back to getting Pamela her drinks, and waiting for the next hunter to, hopefully, walk through the door.

-

The day comes when it’s made clear throughout heaven that Zachariah has been killed by a Winchester and everything that was is now different. Minions scramble to fill the void of his absence, each one still determined to bring in Dean for that deal, Ash assumes.

Change is in the works now, he knows. There’s movement between the imagined spaces of humanity, and hunters come and go as they please now. The power vacuum consumes everything, and the walls between realities crumble. Ash surmises, as usual, that no one is going to bother to fix the collapsing realities, and goes about each day waiting for more change to come into his bar.

With one small change, the dimension is set apart, and as the hunters gather, they know everything is different.

-

None of them are exactly sure what happened to Sam and Dean when the days comes, but so far as they can tell, Earth is nearly a wasteland and all the hunters that frequented the Roadhouse drop to Earth, searching the ground, for what reason they know not. Humanity, like always, cowers and hides, leaving the planet to the demons and the angels who washed up when the battle between Heaven and Hell ended and the few hunters who still _lived_ for the fight.

Ash, Ellen and Jo survey the land, re-adjusting their bearings to the ground and the trees. None of them have seen much outside of their memories and the Roadhouse, but each of them shifts their eyes back and forth letting the light into their eyes before they decide on a path.

“Which way?” Ash asks, still looking for a direction to start off in, confused by the lack of any signs indication either where they were or which direction they should go to reach a city.

“Follow the destruction,” Ellen replies. “Didn’t you learn anything from the first Roadhouse?”

“Eh, not so much. Ya didn’t let me talk much. Just had me in the back, washin’ dishes and using my skills for…” he trails off, looking down at his muddy boots. Ellen doesn’t need a reminder.

“That’s not the point right now. We’ve gotta look for Sam and Dean,” Jo pipes in, intent on some sort of order.

“When did you ever want to follow a plan?” Ellen queries.

“Since I know that nothing good has come of Sam ‘n Dean’s plan.”

“Can we just start moving?” Ash asks, thoroughly annoyed and not a little freaked out by the blackened, barren terrain.

“This way,” Ellen commands, moving them to her left, and away from wherever they were dropped.

\--

As they continue to walk, the wind remains calm. They don’t cross paths with another person for hours. Those hours blur into days, only differentiated by the periods of rest that they give themselves. Shifts of twenty minutes, to keep an eye out for anything still left on the planet.

They have long wondered how it is that all the souls in heaven, or some of them, have found a place on Earth, and how the demons and angels seem to be in short supply, but they don’t focus on that too much when they know at any moment they could be attacked.

\--

Ash misses the confines of that second Roadhouse, the simplicity it provided for him. Instead of the cold feel of glass against his palm, there is hard ground against it as he sleeps. There’s no need to turn his wrist to open a bottle, no need to slide a glass across the top of the bar.

Just the empty wasteland to gaze upon, and some path to follow.

\--

They huddle against each other, shared warmth between them, afraid of lighting a fire to aid their few hours of repose each day.

On the moments before and after they rest, they talk. Nothing profound, just passing moments, tall tales from the old life, small laughs to lighten the load.

\--

He’s not sure when, but a day arrives when they spot something rustling against a tree in the distance.

“Ya ready?” Ellen whispers to Ash and Jo.

“With what?” he wonders.

“Just watch for whatever it is,” Jo retorts, before eyeing the tree intently.

They stand still, looking around for any sign, but just as quickly as the sound caught there attention, it disappears.

\--

Another day passes, and the three finally stumble on another person. Whoever it is cowers in a small shack, avoiding whatever had been through the town.

Ash approaches first, cautious, but curious.

“Hey, we’re here to help,” he says in the same soft, conciliatory tone one might use to coax a frightened animal out into the light.

“How do I know that?” a woman’s voice asks through the door.

“Because we don’t have weapons,” he says, crouching down to peer through a crack in the door, showing her his eyes. “And my eyes are shit-brown, but they sure aren’t black.”

“You could just be pullin’ my leg,” she responds.

Jo joins him at the door, bending beside him. She even pasted on a ghost of her old smirk. “Why would someone else be with him too? Demons usually don’t travel in teams.”

“Spite,” the stranger says.

“Not what we do,” Jo supplies. “We hunt through things that have been all over. You’re the first person we’ve seen in weeks.”

“Don’t bode well for us,” the voice rejoins.

“’Cept, we’re here to find more folk and sort out what happened. Will you help us with that?” Ellen asks, giving up her watchful position to joining the group.

“I didn’t see much,” the woman states, “there just seemed to be a huge explosion with white and black light after.”

“We can work with that,” Ash says, nodding to Ellen and Jo at the thought of being able to find more angels, demons and people if they continue on the path.

“How will that work?” the woman wonders.

Ash watches and Ellen purses her lips before she answers. “We’re hunters, and we’ve got something to look for now.”

“There’s a fight out there, waiting, and if you’ll help us, we’ll show you how to fight against the forces that turned this town into rubble,” Jo continues.

“Whata ya say?” Ash poses, before turning on a small smile. “There’s evil to kill and a road ahead of us.”

The woman finally opens the door to the shack and stretches her arms, back and legs.

“You promise I’ll be safe?”

“As safe as it is out here,” Ellen tells her. “There’s no way we can know how many more are still here until we find ‘em.”

\--

The days still bleed into each other, Ash knows, but more and more frequently the group finds another person still alive and scared. With each new person, the three hunters explain what they can do if they all stay together, pointing to the recruits behind them as proof.

They still haven’t found anyone possessed by either angel or demon, but the group presses forward, looking for any signs.


End file.
